The present invention relates to a cardiac sensing algorithm for identifying arrhythmias based on pacing diagnosis.
Poor discrimination between supraventricular tachycardia and ventricular tachycardia results in unnecessary delivery of shocks in patients with implantable defibrillators. This problem is seen in more than ten percent of patients with implantable cardiac defibrillators. Prior approaches to solve this problem have not focused on distinguishing between supraventricular tachycardia (SVT) and ventricular tachycardia (VT) using dual chamber sensing. One prior approach using dual chamber sensing only concentrates on distinguishing between sinus tachycardia (ST) and ventricular tachycardia. It is desirable that an implantable device be able to recognize and distinguish all forms of supraventricular tachycardia, as well as to discriminate sinus tachycardia from ventricular tachycardia.